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Encouragement for the journey from God’s Word. Today's Scripture: Jeremiah 14:11-16:15 / Proverbs 25:1-5
Well, a good Thursday morning to you. We're reading today in Jeremiah, but I want to first look at a couple of verses in Exodus chapter 34. There is this very succinct description of the heart of God in Exodus 34, and I want us to get that before we look at the passage in Jeremiah.
The Lord passed before Moses and proclaimed. So the Lord is telling Moses about himself, about who he is and what he's like. He says this. He says, the Lord, or Yahweh, Yahweh, God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.
But then he says this, by no means clearing the guilty. So while on the one hand God is merciful and gracious, he's long-suffering, he's abounding in goodness and truth, he keeps mercy for thousands, he forgives iniquity and transgression and sin, on the other hand he doesn't clear the guilty.
So let's keep that in mind when we go to Jeremiah chapter 14, because in Jeremiah 14 and then a verse in chapter 15, we find that there comes a point at which God's long-suffering and his graciousness and his mercy will go no further.
Jeremiah 14, verse 11, brings out one of those points that have been crossed. The Lord said to Jeremiah, do not pray for this people for their good. So there came a point in Judah's rebellion against God and their wickedness, their refusal to hear God's Word.
Remember we mentioned that the other day, their refusal to hear God. They won't listen to him anymore. They're only listening to their own heart and they're going after other gods. So there comes a point in that hardened heart where the Lord says to Jeremiah, don't even pray for them, don't even pray for them.
They're going to suffer and in their suffering there's going to be a, what I would call a crisis repentance, a crisis repentance. But the Lord won't pay any attention to that crisis repentance. Listen to what he says in verse 12.
He says, when they fast I will not hear their cry. When they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence.
So there comes a point where I'm not going to listen to any prayer for them and in their crisis repentance I'm not going to pay any attention to it. Why? Because they have been so hardened in their defiance of God's Word before the crisis hit.
They have no interest in what God has to say, no interest at all in what God has to say in their everyday life. But then when they get in a fix, when they're hurting and suffering, then they want God to get them out of it.
God says don't pray. There comes that point in time. And then in chapter 1 of verse 15, chapter 15 verse 1, he goes further. He says, then the Lord said to me, even if Moses and Samuel stood before me, my mind would not be favorable toward this person.
Cast them out of my sight and let them go forth. The point has been crossed. The point of no return has been crossed. And then in verse 6, the Lord says to his people, you have forsaken me, says the Lord.
You have gone backward. Therefore I will stretch out my hand against you and destroy you. I am weary of relenting, the Lord says. I'm tired of relenting. His long-suffering has been tried. His mercy, his goodness, his forgiveness have been tried over and over and over again.
And they still will not repent. They still will not listen. And the Lord says, okay, I'm weary of holding back my punishment upon you. It's coming. It's coming. You've forsaken me, therefore I stretch out my hand against you.
So I don't know when that point is. I think it's a point in time, a point in one's life and one's hardness of heart that only God knows. But the challenge that we should hear from this is not to test the Lord.
Don't put him to the test. He's been gracious to you. He's been long-suffering to you and to me. Then we need to keep short accounts with him. We need to be daily repenting of our sin, and not allow our hearts to become hardened in it, and to think, well, I can do whatever I want to do.
I can do this and God's not going to do anything to me. I can follow the dictates of my own heart and serve other gods, and God's not going to do anything to me, because after all, he's long-suffering and he's merciful and he forgives sin.
Oh my friend, don't go down that road. Don't go down that road. When God in his grace and by his Spirit convicts your heart of sin, then turn from it, repent of it, and turn to him. Turn to him. He will be merciful.
He will forgive, but not the hardened heart. So our Father and our God, I pray that from this, we would take warning today and realize that there does come a point where the long-suffering has been tried once too much.
So Lord, deliver us from that kind of thinking that says, we can pursue our own path and you won't be bothered. Forgive us of that, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, well have a good rest of your Thursday, and I trust God will bless you on it.
Have a good day.
